Jefferson’s bench-clearing brawl leaves Pittsburg looking for game

The scheduled nonleague football game between Jefferson-Daly City at eighth-ranked Pittsburg Friday has been canceled, leaving Pirates coach Vic Galli scrambling to find an opponent.

According to Jefferson coach Ako Poti, the school was informed by the Central Coast Section that 15 of its players would have to sit out this week for partaking in a bench-clearing brawl that ended last week’s game at Milpitas with 7 minutes, 25 seconds remaining.

Milpitas was leading 19-3 at the time and was awarded the victory.

With only 27 players on its roster, Jefferson didn’t have enough players to suit up against Pittsburg and forfeited the game.

“We were all looking forward to playing a program of the caliber of Pittsburg,” said a despondent Poti Wednesday night. “I feel horrible that (Pittsburg) is now left without a game, scrambling to find something. This was obviously nothing we planned on happening. I take full responsibility.”

Poti, a 1984 Jefferson graduate who played at the University of Utah, is in his third season at his alma mater and helped turn around the program. Last year the Indians went 9-3 and Poti scheduled three preseason Top 25 Metro teams to open the season: Milpitas, Pittsburg and Sacred Heart Cathedral.

He said the last thing he warned his team heading out of the locker room on Friday was to stay clear of any altercations.

“I knew it was going to be a physical game,” Poti said. “It’s a long off-season and both teams were anxious. I told them there would be some mouthing and some shoving but to keep your heads.”

“We have two sets of brothers on the team, first cousins, so our guys are very protective,” Poti said. “I’m not making excuses, but that’s the way it is. It shouldn’t have gotten so out of hand.”

And it probably shouldn’t have taken until midweek, Galli said, for someone to make a decision on Friday’s scheduled game.

He immediately made calls to Milpitas’ opponent this week, Alvarez, but then found out that the Milpitas-Alvarez game was not canceled or forfeited.

That’s likely, according to Poti, is because Milpitas has a roster of more than 45 so however many of its players were ruled ineligible this week, it has enough players to field a team.

Galli said he is waiting to hear from Fremont of Oakland, which has a bye but had to forfeit its first game because of not enough eligible players.

“(Fremont) has enough eligible players now, but I don’t know if we can pull it off,” Galli said. “This really (blows) not only because we lose the gate but our guys need the work.”

This is the second time in five years years Pittsburg has had a home game canceled. In 2006, Galileo couldn’t field enough players for a Week 2 game.

Pittsburg has a bye week Oct. 7, but that is the week before it opens Bay Valley Athletic League play against No. 21 Freedom-Oakley. Galli was hoping to keep that date open. Now that might not be possible.

Any program that can fill Friday’s date are encouraged to contact Galli at 925-550-9095.